A Traitor's End
by elektra121
Summary: My version of Grima's death... reviews highly appreciated!


A Traitor's End  
  
Author's Note:  
  
It was to me a heart`s need to write this story down even if it`s so very short; because I found Grima's end as described in the book rather unsatisfactory. (Hmm… Let`s see what the film-people make of it... They seem somewhat more interested in his motives!) Actually, I don`t like Wormtongue very much, but I am at the opinion that nearly every character earns a few good last words or at least a little peace and reconciliation in death - and here`s my conception of it...   
  
I'd like to thank my faithful beta-reader Susi-Schatz, for she helped me a lot with the translation. English is not my first language, so please -if you find any mistakes, tell me!  
  
Read and enjoy! (and don`t forget to review!)   
  
***   
  
Wormtongue didn't get any far.   
  
He didn't make even a dozen steps downhill when three hobbits' arrows whirred from their chords and pierced straight into the traitor's back. He fell, head over heels, and rolled some way aside, where he remained lying in the high grass.   
  
But Grima didn't die instantaneously.   
  
The hobbits observed with horror how he rose to his knees, writhed and crept further for a dreadful minute, as if it was his last credit to the name that Saruman had given to him, when he already had to die so completely honourless otherwise.   
  
With the last strength he finally turned onto his side and for one last time his hand wormed its way, twitching, into a hidden pocket of his dusty, ragged coat, where it would grip to make sure the preciousness contained there could never be taken away from him in this life.   
  
When his fingers had achieved this last comfort, his pale lips twisted into a weak smile.   
  
Then his features relaxed and his eyes turned blank.   
  
He was dead.  
  
  
  
"And that's the end of that," Sam said. "A nasty end, and I wish I needn't have seen it; but it's a good riddance."   
  
"It shouldn't have been,", Frodo answered. "I feel sorry for him. I don't think he has ever been very happy in his life."   
  
"Nevertheless, it's better this way," Sam said, and a few other hobbits nodded in agreement. "We'll be sleeping much more calmly tonight."   
  
"There were times I would have thought the same," Frodo sighed."But now…?"   
  
He shook his head sadly.   
  
"Nonetheless…" Merry said reasonably, "... we will have to bury him. Saruman at least removed this trouble from us!" And thus he descended down the hill.   
  
Pippin followed. Sam and other hobbits went for the shovels in order to get through the unpleasant work as fast as possible.   
  
"I'd like to know what it was, that he wanted to hold so desperately before dying?" Pippin asked, being completely lively again as he knelt down in the grass beside the body.   
  
"Don't know..." Merry answered, somewhat taken aback by Pippins enthusiasm. "But apparently it was of high value to him. Just look - he's smiling."   
  
"Perhaps it is some kind of charm?" Pippin's eyes shone with curiosity.   
  
"Or some kind of small Palantir...!" Merry warned half seriously, but he was growing curious, too.   
  
"No way! Nothing could happen now anyway, Mr. Merry!" Pippin ignored his reproach and slowly pulled Wormetongue's hand, still being stained with Saruman's blood, out of the pocket.   
  
Merry felt uncomfortable watching his cousin unbending the fingers of a dead man, and he was about to beg him to let go but…   
  
"Got it!" Pippin called and held the mysterious piece into the light.   
  
It wasn't anything more but a small two-toothed hairpin, one of those the women of Rohan used to wear; but when Merry noticed the artful craft and when he saw the sun shining gently on the tiny jumping golden horse, he guessed whom that pin had belonged to. And it touched his heart.   
  
"Strange," Pippin said quietly, "I don't know why, Merry, but it makes me sad. Somehow I feel sorry for the poor guy, like Mr. Frodo. I think I'd better give this thing back to him."   
  
And he put the pin back into Grima's hand, and Merry closed the stiffening fingers around it again; and then they looked at each other and decided not to tell anyone anything of what they had found.   
  
It seemed to be right that way.   
  
And so they buried the former counsellor to the king of Rohan in the Shire, without much ado, on the side of a dirt road. And with him they buried his most precious earthly possession, which he held firmly clasped in his hand, still in death.   
  
Eowyn's hairpin.   
  
***   
  
(... When he struggled with death, the sun set down over the hill, its light dazzling his dying eyes.   
  
And suddenly, he couldn't decide, whether it was the setting sun shining so brightly or her gleaming sun-bright hair, which seemed to sparkle in the darkness of the Hall.   
  
And he seemed to hear her laughing like she never had laughed when she knew him near. And he thougt to hear her steps in the Hall as they approached. And he knew that this time she would not be frightened by him, not be running away; that this time she would not be disgusted, like all the many times before.   
  
This time was different.   
  
And he smiled...)   
  
The End 


End file.
